If you want some excellent writing and delicious artwork for free, check out the online graphic novel Freak Angels. It’s right good.

A young Irishman sits in a Paris jail.  He has confessed to a murder his lawyer is convinced he did not commit.  There is a witness of the run in the city of Paris, and she, a young street kid, may have the answer.  But his neurotic Paris Lawyer, haunted by his own rural upbringing […]

There’s now a whole section in WH Smiths in town dubbed ‘Tragic Life Stories’, 80% of which is child abuse.  What the hell is the reading world coming to?  Why the fascination that is now so lucrative, there’s a section as large as ‘Travel’ dedicated to it?

<5 minutes>
“The world doesn’t need anymore photographers.  It doesn’t need any more lawyers.  It doesn’t need any more shop assistants.  Unless you’re the new messiah, shit diamonds or secreting the cure for AIDS out of your nipples, you are nothing original and totally redundant.”
The entire hall shuffled and there were a few brief nervous laughs.  […]

This is a really good opportunity for writers of short stories that have not previously been published.  Here’s the info:

Jasmine Cottage Publishing are looking for donations of original, previously unpublished short stories for inclusion in a forthcoming book, MS Talent: Volume 2.
MS Talent: Volume 2 is scheduled for publication in November 2008 and is likely […]

An older piece. Just wanted to show that I do write ‘nice’ things as well. Image by Frankisek Staud.

Seahorses

Tominaga-cho, Gion, came to life in the early afternoon, before the purple of dusk seeped into the horizon behind the mountains and whilst the ground was still warm from the midday sun. […]

I’ve been writing for the public forum for going on eleven years now, and I’ve had my fair share of flames - feedback that doesn’t have the remotest glimmer of positive in it.  It’s interesting how often people will quietly move on if they read something they like, but will then sit and spend the […]

I can sum up my feelings about this book in one sentence: wave upon wave of disappointment.
This isn’t a criticism, however.
Firstly, it’s not immediately obvious that this book is not a novel but a collection of short stories.  I saw the title and thought ‘ah, it’s about ‘that Wow signal, which is a pretty spiffy […]

A few people have said they want to read the story from which an extract made ripples at the conference on Saturday. This piece was written to consciously confront our common desire to look away. Its intent does not lie in the characters or the story itself. It’s a fictionalization of a […]

Aww, look at the puppy.  Baby Harvey…

Thought that would get your attention.  I know how you work, internet…  It’s cute animals or boobs.
So, I’m finally making a post about the conference on Saturday.
It took a while to find the place and it turned out to be one of the smaller campuses of the John Moores […]